All fine and dandy, but just how does Google Translate perform? The search monolith admits: "While our system is quite good, we know it's not perfect. Machine translation is a hard problem, but it plays an important role in helping people access content they might otherwise be unable to read."

Well, since this hack is no slouch in the Spanish department, I decided to put the thing to the test. Here's a snippet of news regarding a drugs bust from today's El País:

The Guardia Civil de Huelva last night arrested 29 people and intervened to 4,000 kilos of hashish in the largest operation against drug trafficking developed in the province. It took a macro-operation divided into two separate and collaboration of the Customs Surveillance Service. Among those arrested are 16 Russians and the rest comes from Spain, Poland, Romania, Ukraine and Morocco, as reported yesterday by the Civil Guard.

Actually, that really isn't a bad effort. Now, if you'll excuse me, since I've just said something positive about Google, I need a quick siesta in a darkened room. ®